Heidi Norton: to Threptikon

Aristotle postulated that plants have a vegetative soul called “to threptikon”. Centuries later, Charles Darwin hypothesized that plants are cognitive organisms with a “root-brain” acting as a control center. These ideas are still hotly debated, but recent studies prove that plants are not just passive, immobile organisms; they’re endowed with sophisticated abilities to communicate, signal, and detect danger- above ground and below.